“They called it ‘the bonding,’ ” Strukov said mockingly. “But you know that better than me, isn’t it? You yourself made the holo the peasants have watched. After they saw it, they injected themselves with the red syringes, and so they became bonded. Now then, this is three hours since the woman is carried away.”
The abducted woman sat alone in a comfortable room. Abruptly she gasped, clutched her chest, and slid off her chair. Her eyes stared in death. The holo superimposed a robocam shot of the two men who had bonded with her, also dead.
“An electrical event in the heart,” Strukov said. “A very clean mechanism, very elegant. I like this technique to control your peasants. Render them very dependent on each other and their actions can be only very limited, yes? A good design. But you do not choose this design. You tell me, leave this attempt, give me something different.”
Will didn’t answer directly. “This whole range of fears you can induce permanently—the biochemistry dictates they’re all as pronounced as these two examples?”
“But no. These NMDA receptors have been strongly activated. They have created the neural pathways of the great strength. It is possible to create the lesser effects.”
Will said, “Is it possible for you to create them?”
“But of course. Angelique, ça va.”
The holostage switched to screen mode. Screen after screen of charts, equations, molecular diagrams, chemical formulas, tables of variables, and ion reaction schematics flashed past, as maliciously complex as the previous demonstrations had been simplistic.
Strukov said, “Much of the work on the fear and the anxiety has concerned itself with the synapses, the neurotransmitters, and the receptor subtypes. I have concerned myself more with the processes of the cellular stress inside the nerve cells, where the neuropeptides form themselves. Here is where the chemical reactions originate and conclude. Each pyramidal neuron receives as many as a hundred thousand contacts from those neurons to which they connect. One therefore begins with models of the nerve transmission.
“And with one other thing. There exist the peptides that form themselves only under the pathological conditions. It is possible to instigate a chain reaction of the complex amines, beginning inside a cell. Some amines in the chain are pathological; some are normal; some are the endogenous excitatory amino acids transformed into the excitotoxins. This chain, it has its beginning in the altered pathways of the amygdalae.
“From there, it extends itself through the central nerve nucleus to the interiors of the cells in many other places—in the brain, in the muscles, in the glands and the organs. The chain ends in affecting many bioamines, including the acetylcholine—look at this chart, here—the norepinephrine, the CRF, the glutamate, the critical gamma C—many many amines.
“Moreover, that chain will go on constantly, once begun by the triggering virus. And since the chain consists of the substances entirely created by the brain itself, the stupid Cell Cleaner does not attack them. It will destroy the virus, but by that time, it is too late. The chain has begun. And according to the stupid Cell Cleaner, the chain belongs there. According to the stupid Cell Cleaner, the chain is native.” Strukov laughed. “And so it is.”
Will said, “And all human brains will respond the same way to the initiating virus?”
Strukov shrugged. “Of course not. The people always differ in their response to anything that impacts the biogenic amines. Some will sicken. Some will respond too strongly. A few will not respond at all. But most will become what you have requested me to make them: inhibited, fearful of anything new, filled with the anxiety at any separation from the familiar. Like the babies with the stranger anxiety. In the essence, my chain reaction brings forward as primary a more primitive function of the brain, which human growth suppresses in favor of the more complex functions. I reverse that.”
Strukov looked directly at Jennifer and smiled. “I will, in its finality, turn your target population into a nation of the fearful children.”
Jennifer gazed back. She had to fight showing her revulsion for the huge bearded giant completely absorbed in his own genius, completely at ease with its demonstration on his own people. Jennifer had always known that Sleepers had no loyalty to their own, no moral sense. They would do anything to each other, if enough money was involved. Nor were they capable of distinguishing between the prison term served by Jennifer, a penalty borne of the Sleepers’ fear of her and of her own sense of moral obligation to safeguard her own, and the prison term that would be served by this brilliant vermin if his brain tampering was discovered by Sleeper authorities. Strukov was a disease. She would use a disease to protect her people, if she had to. But she would not give a disease the moral courtesy of tradition.
She stood, eyes meeting Strukov’s. “And you can deliver the triggering genemod virus by injection, without detection?”
“I have said so,” Strukov said, amused, as the three Arabs rose angrily to their feet. “The vector contains sixteen different proteins, five of which never before have existed. All will be destroyed by the Cell Cleaner long before any scientific authorities can isolate and culture them.”
Karim said to Will, “We had an agreement about who will speak at this meeting!”
“Injection will not do for us,” Jennifer said to Strukov.
He answered, smiling, “Your granddaughter remade the human body, and you will remake the human mind, isn’t it?”
“What we do is not your concern,” Jennifer said, at the same moment that Beshir said hotly to Will, “Control your wife!”
Strukov said, “Do you speak always in the first-person plural, Madame Sharifi? What delivery of the virus do you require? And on what schedule?”
“Two different delivery modes. One developed and tested as soon as possible, the other to follow a month later.”
“And those two modes of the delivery are…?”
She told him.
Six
Jackson woke to the sure knowledge that someone was moving around his bedroom in the dark.
A dream? No. The intruder was real. And not a ’bot. A dim human blur across the room, passing briefly in front of the semi-opaqued window. Theresa? She didn’t come into his room at night, and if she did, she’d turn on the light.
He lay still, simulating the deep breathing of sleep, and considered his choices. He could call for building security, but not even the neuropharm option would take effect before the intruder shot Jackson at the sound of his voice. He could roll off the bed, keeping it between himself and the window, and try to reach the personal security shield in the bottom dresser drawer. Or was it in the second-bottom drawer? He pictured himself fumbling naked through his socks and underwear, groping for the thing while the intruder politely waited. Yes, sure. He could lunge off the bed and try to tackle the intruder, counting on surprise to keep from getting shot.
In the seconds it took him to decide, the intruder said, “Lights on,” and the room lit up. “Hello, Jackson darling,” Cazie said.
She was naked, and covered with mud. It caked on her pubic muff, smeared across her full breasts, fell off in wet globs onto his white carpet. Immediately Jackson felt his penis stiffen. What if he’d made an idiot of himself by calling for security?
“God damn it. Cazie, what the hell do you think you’re doing?”